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Friday, September 26, 2014

Love Songs!! Are they as potent today as yesteryear?

The
age old debate has seemingly re-emerged, about the potency of modern R&B
and soul music versus those of the rhythm and blues’ ‘golden era’ following
mega hits by John Legend, All of Me
and Sam Smith with Stay With Me. There
has long been the feeling in and around world music industries that songs of
the modern era do not stand the test of time as those of the 60s and 70s have
managed to do so much so that they are still covered and sampled on a vast
amount of modern tracks.

Michael Barnett, a respected Jamaican musicologist, has been
collecting records since the 1960s. He believes music standards have fallen
considerably because the music business has become just that; a business.

“You don’t have people creating anymore. Melodies and
instruments which were a big part of soul music is no more. What you have now
are beats, and oftentimes when you hear it (the song) twice you get tired of
it,” said Barnett.

Sampling

In an interview with Billboard
magazine during the 1990s, singer, Howard Hewett of Shalamar fame, commented on
the increasingly popular trend of sampling. He said while it involved a level
of creativity and helped expose music of other eras to contemporary audiences,
he also saw a downside.

“What are we going to listen to 20-30 years from now?”
Hewett asked.

It seems though, with the ever increasing level of sampling
in modern music productions, Hewett’s concerns have materialized. Rhythm and
Blues and soul music, the music which inspired him, has morphed into a
multi-million pop industry driven by one-hit wonders and disposable songs. Sampling
is now full-blown, with even the most talented of the neo-soul movement borrowing
heavily from music of the 1960s and 1970s, largely considered the golden age of
R&B and soul.

Some of the leading in neo-soul artistes such as Keys,
D’Angelo and John Legend have sampled or covered the music of James Brown,
Roberta Flack and Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. They have put new sheen on
classics like Brown’s It’s a Man’s World,
Cruising, originally done by Smokey
Robinson and Wake up Everybody by the
Blue Notes. Whether a different generation of artistes will sample or cover
their work is left to be seen.

Old
School versus New Method

Hewett, like many R&B and soul legends, earned his
stripes the ‘old fashioned’ way. He got involved in the music business during
the late 1970s with an independent company called SOLAR (Sounds Of Los Angeles
Records) which groomed artistes similar to how Motown and Stax did a decade
earlier.

Those companies nurtured the careers of the Supremes, the
Four Tops, Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes and Sam
and Dave. They were run by strong-willed bosses in Berry Gordy and Al Bell.

Motown and Stax also had champion house bands such as the
Funk Brothers and Booker T and the MGs who helped shape the sound and delivery
of those acts.

“People like Berry Gordy had committees at Motown who would
listen to all the songs recorded there before they could get released. You had
Smokey, (songwriters) Holland/Dozier/Holland on these committees and it couldn’t
get pass them if it wasn’t well done,” explained Michael Barnett of the old
school method.

Today the Internet and social media has had a profound
effect on R&B. Radio still plays a major role in exposing an artiste but
nothing compared to mediums such as YouTube and Instagram which offers fans
instant access into their favourite artiste’s latest productions. Songs are no
longer hits based on quality, but more so, on their popularity and commercial
success without concern of being relevant for years down the line. Hence hits
of today are only hits for as long as they remain relevant and quite often that
is only a few months.

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Caught on Camera

Always ahead of the game, Damian Marley (l) and soca vikings Bunji Garlin (r) were joined on set by dancehall artiste Popcaan, Fay-Ann Lyons and comedian Majah Hype for the video shoot for their single The Message in Trinidad recently.